The importance of local language in Ecuador

@Cheryl  Hi Cheryl. I have a story for you. While sitting at an outside cafe in Esmeraldas each morning, students would walk past me, notice I am a "gringo", and frequently would ask if I could teach them English.  Initially, I thought it was a ridiculous request, as I am a retired banker, and not a teacher. The requests were constant, and one day I stopped to think of how I could help these students.  So for the next 6 months I made notes, while sipping my coffee at the cafe. The imagination and motivation mounted. At the end of the 6 months I had written: KNOWLEDGE IS POWER-ENGLISH LEARNING GUIDE.  I began teaching English, using this "student friendly" guide.

A famous quotation inspired by faith:  "God moves in mysterious ways."  I believe I was guided toward the writing of my learing guide, and then to teaching.  It never seemed like a normal human transition. But here I am.  So, although your writing is about foreigners learning Spanish, my English learning guide can assist in both teaching efforts, because of the way in which it is written. Every English word in the guide has the associated Spanish word next to it.  I would love to share my guide with you, and maybe you can find a place for it, within your travels.  If interested, I can send you a "free" copy of my guide. (Standard pricing per guide is: Ecuador $15;  U.S. $20)   

*Note: This format does not allow me to send a photo of the cover of my learning guide.

Take care, Cheryl.  And thanks for connecting.

Years ago, Expat.com had an Experts Team member

named James who managed the Brazil forum and

mentored some newer members who went on to

join the Experts Team.

The principal language in Brazil is Portuguese. James

created a thread on the Brazil forum to teach

that language to Gringos.

In the last year of his life, James offered to sponsor me

to join the Experts Team after reading my posts over a

period of months on the Ecuador forum.

When I joined the Team, James's first suggestion

to me was to create a Spanish-language thread on

the Ecuador forum. Using his template from Brazil,

I created a thread called Shortcuts to Learning español.

Later, I created a second thread on the Ecuador forum

titled español for Gringos.

Those threads now contain more than 1,000 posts

intended to aid Expats and new arrivals in learning

the principal language of Ecuador, Colombia and

more than a dozen other countries in Latin America

where Spanish is el idioma prinicipal.

A number of us who have been on this site for

quite a while (almost a decade for me) miss James

and appreciate his coaching skills that spread

his knowledge and support throughout Expat.com

during his lifetime and beyond.

cccmedia, Expert for Ecuador and Colombia

Resident of Quito, Ecuador